NY - Albany to run anti-father PBS story Thursday night @ 10

This guy's an "investigative reporter"??? This "story" is so blatantly
anti-father, this guy should be shot. I'm sure the script that PBS followed
was written by a feminazi.. The "reporter" certainly is.

Fortunatly, this "senior editor" left his contact info at the bottom of the
article... Give'em an ear full - of TRUTH.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

http://timesunion.com/AspStories/sto...gory=OPINION&B
CCode=HOME&newsdate=10/16/2005

Custody fight

Documentary sheds light on system that lets children suffer at the hands of
abusive fathers

By BOB PORT
First published: Sunday, October 16, 2005

This week, every judge, lawyer, psychiatrist, psychol social worker with any
connection to family law in New York ought to be taken into custody,
escorted to their local courthouse and forced to watch "Breaking the
Silence: Children's Stories," a PBS documentary set to air in the Capital
Region at 10 p.m. Thursday on WMHT Ch. 17.
Before coming to Albany, I worked for years at the New York Daily News. I
had occasion to cover stories from Family Court and custody battles, largely
in New York City. I've heard the tales of more than a hundred people in
recent years caught up in the "Twilight Zone" of a custody dispute, as many
of them identically refer to the legal system.

This exquisite documentary, "Children's Stories," like no other production I
have seen, makes comprehensible the subtlety of a scandal that recurs in
custody proceedings in New York and other states. It is an almost impossible
story to tell, one from which journalists flee, and it boils down to this: A
judge, often misled by self-interested lawyers and court-appointed
professionals, ignores a protective mother, ignores the wishes of children
and awards custody to a man who is an abuser, emotionally or physically, of
his wife or their children.

In a bitter irony, the judge orders this injustice wrapped in the banner
that is New York's legal standard for deciding custody: "best interests of
the child."

What our legal system has failed to grasp is that lust for vengeance drives
the worst of fathers to use litigation itself as a way to abuse ex-wives.
Their economic incentive has also grown. Winning custody can be cheaper than
child support.

"Children's Stories," filmed partly in Loudonville, will not try your
patience with he-said, she-said debate between couples or among experts.
Save that for later. Instead, the filmmakers select wise experts to explain
and ask that you do two things our courts easily fail to do: Trust mothers
to behave like mothers and listen to what children say.

There is little Sarah, ordered to live with a father she feared. "You feel
like," she says, biting her lip, "you want to die."

There is the terror-stricken voice of Manya recorded on the phone, pleading
with her mother to rescue her from her father, who molested her for years.
"I don't care if you have to break the law," she sobs, "get me out right
now."

There are the observations of Jeff, who turned 18 and escaped, but who
remains haunted at having lain awake across the hall from his little sister
as she was raped and sodomized by his dad, who won custody. "It's the most
helpless feeling," Jeff laments.

These are the raw extremes of custody law gone awry. The typical abusive
parent is less severe or far less obvious, and abuse is always difficult to
discern. Two adult men speak in "Children's Stories" with memories of their
own abusive fathers to shed light.

One of them, Joe Torre, manager of the New York Yankees, who suffered in the
care of a violent father, recalls why he never called police. "My father was
the police," Torre says.

"It is never an event," says the other, Walter Anderson, CEO of Parade
magazine. "It is a pattern of behavior." Abuse, he explains, is "the
systematic diminishment of the child." This common sense can elude family
courts.

Some facts are in order here. We're talking about a big but very narrow
problem. Custody is not disputed in court in the overwhelming majority of
divorces as many as nine in 10 cases settle amicably, according to studies.
In uncontested custody, mothers win out over fathers, taking custody about
2-1, although this is partly because some fathers see trying to win custody
as futile.

Contested custody, about 10 percent of break-ups, clogs courts. In these
disputes, some studies show, a mildly abusive, or brutally battering or
seriously molesting parent lurks in three fourths of cases. It can be a
mother, but mostly it tends to be a father, and recent studies show fathers
winning these battles 2-1.
Do the math. It's a problem.

Custody case law in New York, as in many states, enshrines one of the most
ridiculous legal principles ever to evolve, called "parental alienation."

Conceived by the late Columbia University psychiatrist Richard Gardner,
"parental alienation syndrome" was a proposed name for a mental illness in
which a mother, to punish her ex-mate, alienates kids against dad by
coaching them to allege abuse.

The antidote for this alleged insanity, Gardner theorized, is to give the
kids to dad, thereby counteracting mom's alienation by removing the kids
from her control. It's the ultimate mind game in custody battles. We can
almost never prove what's really true in an abuse allegation, and a bald
abuse allegation, even if false or exaggerated itself, can be symptomatic of
a deeper, less severe pattern that is true. The victim of abuse thus becomes
the perpetrator and a villain can win. Gardner's ideas became a playbook for
fathers using litigation to punish ex-lovers.

Gardner's colleagues rejected the addition of his theory to the Diagnostic
and Statistical Manual, the peer-reviewed handbook of mental illnesses. His
work has been debunked by the American Psychological Association and others.
Parental alienation syndrome is junk science.

Yet in a monument to ignorance, New York courts continue to recognize
"parental alienation" as if it were some psycho-law of medicine and continue
to give kids to oppressive, if not abusive fathers simply when mothers make
accusations. It's as if judges are years behind in reading social science
literature.

Father's rights groups have legitimate concerns about false abuse
allegations, but given the nature of contested custody, these utterances
should not trigger instant death for mothers. Yet, Gardner's remedy for
alienation is etched in precedent in our state appellate law books. Judges
continue to fall for it as medical dogma when it comes from court-appointed
forensic psychiatrists. These experts, unregulated in the court system, are
often ordered by a judge to evaluate parents, but they answer to no one.
They must be right, judges are pressed to believe. After all, judges
appointed them.

In "Children's Stories," a judge, who happens to be a social worker, as
perhaps we should require of all our Family Court judges, tries to set the
record straight. Maybe our Court of Appeals will get the message.

Also aired in this documentary are the problems with some law guardians,
lawyers appointed for children. The documentary shows us how they can do
more harm than good. They can be patronage-seeking pals of judges who
authorize legal fees billed to parents for whatever the market will bear.

Law guardians may not listen to their clients, the children, and they
inevitably end up taking sides, then avoid communication with the losing
side. They can freely engage in what lawyers call ex-parte communication
they talk to one side without the other present. Judges do it, too. It's
unethical and it deprives one party of a fair hearing. Yet, in our family
courts, ex-parte exchanges, even hearings, can be standard operating
procedure.

Dominique Lasseur, the producer of "Children's Stories," told me he expects
to be sued, but I say he deserves a Nobel Prize for honesty for his work
here. The Mary Kay Ash Charitable Foundation, which financed this effort,
deserves our gratitude. And this documentary should prove again the
incalculable value of public broadcasting.

An annual event at Siena College became the setting for some of "Children's
Stories." Mo Therese Hannah, a psychology professor at Siena, is already
organizing the third Battered Mothers' Custody Conference there, set for
next January.

The judiciary in New York is aware of the problems you'll see on TV. A
32-member Matrimonial Commission, appointed by our chief judge, has heard
from hundreds of citizens. Appellate Judge Sondra Miller of Westchester
County, chairwoman, says her commission is preparing its report for release
in December and it will recommend major changes.

"We hope that we can change the tenor of these proceedings," Miller said.
She intimated her commission is considering some new court model for
resolving custody, one based on principles of mediation and arbitration more
than advocacy.

We'll all be watching.

Bob Port is senior editor/investigations at the Times Union. He can be
reached at 454-5064 or by e-mail at



--------------------------------------------------------------------
Liberalism: that haunting fear that someone,
somewhere, can help themselves without
Government intervention.

"Dusty" wrote in message
...
This guy's an "investigative reporter"??? This "story" is so blatantly
anti-father, this guy should be shot. I'm sure the script that PBS
followed
was written by a feminazi.. The "reporter" certainly is.

Fortunatly, this "senior editor" left his contact info at the bottom of
the
article... Give'em an ear full - of TRUTH.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

http://timesunion.com/AspStories/sto...gory=OPINION&B
CCode=HOME&newsdate=10/16/2005

Custody fight

Documentary sheds light on system that lets children suffer at the hands
of
abusive fathers

By BOB PORT
First published: Sunday, October 16, 2005

This week, every judge, lawyer, psychiatrist, psychol social worker with
any
connection to family law in New York ought to be taken into custody,
escorted to their local courthouse and forced to watch "Breaking the
Silence: Children's Stories," a PBS documentary set to air in the Capital
Region at 10 p.m. Thursday on WMHT Ch. 17.
Before coming to Albany, I worked for years at the New York Daily News. I
had occasion to cover stories from Family Court and custody battles,
largely
in New York City. I've heard the tales of more than a hundred people in
recent years caught up in the "Twilight Zone" of a custody dispute, as
many
of them identically refer to the legal system.

This exquisite documentary, "Children's Stories," like no other production
I
have seen, makes comprehensible the subtlety of a scandal that recurs in
custody proceedings in New York and other states. It is an almost
impossible
story to tell, one from which journalists flee, and it boils down to this:
A
judge, often misled by self-interested lawyers and court-appointed
professionals, ignores a protective mother, ignores the wishes of children
and awards custody to a man who is an abuser, emotionally or physically,
of
his wife or their children.

In a bitter irony, the judge orders this injustice wrapped in the banner
that is New York's legal standard for deciding custody: "best interests of
the child."

What our legal system has failed to grasp is that lust for vengeance
drives
the worst of fathers to use litigation itself as a way to abuse ex-wives.
Their economic incentive has also grown. Winning custody can be cheaper
than
child support.

"Children's Stories," filmed partly in Loudonville, will not try your
patience with he-said, she-said debate between couples or among experts.
Save that for later. Instead, the filmmakers select wise experts to
explain
and ask that you do two things our courts easily fail to do: Trust mothers
to behave like mothers and listen to what children say.

There is little Sarah, ordered to live with a father she feared. "You feel
like," she says, biting her lip, "you want to die."

There is the terror-stricken voice of Manya recorded on the phone,
pleading
with her mother to rescue her from her father, who molested her for years.
"I don't care if you have to break the law," she sobs, "get me out right
now."

There are the observations of Jeff, who turned 18 and escaped, but who
remains haunted at having lain awake across the hall from his little
sister
as she was raped and sodomized by his dad, who won custody. "It's the most
helpless feeling," Jeff laments.

These are the raw extremes of custody law gone awry. The typical abusive
parent is less severe or far less obvious, and abuse is always difficult
to
discern. Two adult men speak in "Children's Stories" with memories of
their
own abusive fathers to shed light.

One of them, Joe Torre, manager of the New York Yankees, who suffered in
the
care of a violent father, recalls why he never called police. "My father
was
the police," Torre says.

"It is never an event," says the other, Walter Anderson, CEO of Parade
magazine. "It is a pattern of behavior." Abuse, he explains, is "the
systematic diminishment of the child." This common sense can elude family
courts.

Some facts are in order here. We're talking about a big but very narrow
problem. Custody is not disputed in court in the overwhelming majority of
divorces as many as nine in 10 cases settle amicably, according to
studies.
In uncontested custody, mothers win out over fathers, taking custody about
2-1, although this is partly because some fathers see trying to win
custody
as futile.

Contested custody, about 10 percent of break-ups, clogs courts. In these
disputes, some studies show, a mildly abusive, or brutally battering or
seriously molesting parent lurks in three fourths of cases. It can be a
mother, but mostly it tends to be a father, and recent studies show
fathers
winning these battles 2-1.
Do the math. It's a problem.

Custody case law in New York, as in many states, enshrines one of the most
ridiculous legal principles ever to evolve, called "parental alienation."

Conceived by the late Columbia University psychiatrist Richard Gardner,
"parental alienation syndrome" was a proposed name for a mental illness in
which a mother, to punish her ex-mate, alienates kids against dad by
coaching them to allege abuse.

The antidote for this alleged insanity, Gardner theorized, is to give the
kids to dad, thereby counteracting mom's alienation by removing the kids
from her control. It's the ultimate mind game in custody battles. We can
almost never prove what's really true in an abuse allegation, and a bald
abuse allegation, even if false or exaggerated itself, can be symptomatic
of
a deeper, less severe pattern that is true. The victim of abuse thus
becomes
the perpetrator and a villain can win. Gardner's ideas became a playbook
for
fathers using litigation to punish ex-lovers.

Gardner's colleagues rejected the addition of his theory to the Diagnostic
and Statistical Manual, the peer-reviewed handbook of mental illnesses.
His
work has been debunked by the American Psychological Association and
others.
Parental alienation syndrome is junk science.

Yet in a monument to ignorance, New York courts continue to recognize
"parental alienation" as if it were some psycho-law of medicine and
continue
to give kids to oppressive, if not abusive fathers simply when mothers
make
accusations. It's as if judges are years behind in reading social science
literature.

Father's rights groups have legitimate concerns about false abuse
allegations, but given the nature of contested custody, these utterances
should not trigger instant death for mothers. Yet, Gardner's remedy for
alienation is etched in precedent in our state appellate law books. Judges
continue to fall for it as medical dogma when it comes from
court-appointed
forensic psychiatrists. These experts, unregulated in the court system,
are
often ordered by a judge to evaluate parents, but they answer to no one.
They must be right, judges are pressed to believe. After all, judges
appointed them.

In "Children's Stories," a judge, who happens to be a social worker, as
perhaps we should require of all our Family Court judges, tries to set the
record straight. Maybe our Court of Appeals will get the message.

Also aired in this documentary are the problems with some law guardians,
lawyers appointed for children. The documentary shows us how they can do
more harm than good. They can be patronage-seeking pals of judges who
authorize legal fees billed to parents for whatever the market will bear.

Law guardians may not listen to their clients, the children, and they
inevitably end up taking sides, then avoid communication with the losing
side. They can freely engage in what lawyers call ex-parte communication
they talk to one side without the other present. Judges do it, too. It's
unethical and it deprives one party of a fair hearing. Yet, in our family
courts, ex-parte exchanges, even hearings, can be standard operating
procedure.

Dominique Lasseur, the producer of "Children's Stories," told me he
expects
to be sued, but I say he deserves a Nobel Prize for honesty for his work
here. The Mary Kay Ash Charitable Foundation, which financed this effort,
deserves our gratitude. And this documentary should prove again the
incalculable value of public broadcasting.

An annual event at Siena College became the setting for some of
"Children's
Stories." Mo Therese Hannah, a psychology professor at Siena, is already
organizing the third Battered Mothers' Custody Conference there, set for
next January.

The judiciary in New York is aware of the problems you'll see on TV. A
32-member Matrimonial Commission, appointed by our chief judge, has heard
from hundreds of citizens. Appellate Judge Sondra Miller of Westchester
County, chairwoman, says her commission is preparing its report for
release
in December and it will recommend major changes.

"We hope that we can change the tenor of these proceedings," Miller said.
She intimated her commission is considering some new court model for
resolving custody, one based on principles of mediation and arbitration
more
than advocacy.

We'll all be watching.

Bob Port is senior editor/investigations at the Times Union. He can be
reached at 454-5064 or by e-mail at



--------------------------------------------------------------------
Liberalism: that haunting fear that someone,
somewhere, can help themselves without
Government intervention.

Here is the e-mail I have sent in response to this story:

Dear Mr. Port:

Your story about the PBS documentary "Breaking the Silence: Children's
Stories" was put up on an Internet news group that I follow. I am disturbed
by the whole flavor of the story.

It appears from this story that you have been seriously misled. You
should look at the big picture. The overall truth of the situation is that
the judicial system in the U.S. is grotesquely biased against fathers. I
have been following these issues for nearly 20 years. The fact of the
matter is that, while the statistics vary from one jurisdiction to another,
the highest percentage I have ever seen for paternal custody is 15. In
short, the glass ceiling on paternal custody remains firmly in place. The
realistic approach for most fathers facing divorce is to assume that custody
will be decided, not by the courts or any other third party, but by the
mother. If she wants custody she will get it, regardless of what the father
wants.

So the idea that that there is any significant tendency to award custody
to abusive fathers, or ANY fathers, is just nonsense. It is far more true
to say that allegations of abuse directed at the father have become almost a
routine weapon in custody disputes where the mother feels there is any
danger that she will not gain custody.

There are, of course, well-known dangers in generalizing from the
particular. However, from your article, it seems that you find anecdotal
evidence to be very compelling. So perhaps you will find the story of what
happened in a Maryland suburb of Washington, D.C., to be an illustration of
the other side of this issue. Here is the latest round of court action in
this case:

Md. Lawyer Convicted in Plot to Kill Husband

By Nelson Hernandez
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 8, 2005; Page B04

A Bethesda lawyer accused of conspiring with her best friend to kill her
estranged husband as a way of resolving a bitter child-custody battle was
convicted on all counts yesterday by a Frederick County jury.

The verdict came after a two-week court battle culminating in a heated
11-hour session in the jury room.

The guilty decision against Elsa D. Newman -- on charges of conspiracy to
commit first-degree murder and attempted first-degree murder, as well as
three lesser charges -- came 10 months after Maryland's highest court threw
out her conviction in Montgomery County, prompting a retrial and the
movement of the case to Frederick County Circuit Court.

Prosecutors claimed that Newman, 52, became so desperate after losing
custody of her two sons that she plotted with a close friend, former State
Department employee Margery Lemb Landry, to kill her husband, Arlen J.
Slobodow. Landry broke into Slobodow's home in Bethesda early Jan. 7, 2002,
while Slobodow was sleeping in a bed with his 5-year-old son, and shot
Slobodow in the leg.

Landry escaped after a struggle, but Slobodow was able to tear off the ski
mask covering her face and called police. He survived the attack.

After pleading guilty in September 2002, Landry was sentenced to 20 years in
prison. In the first trial, Newman also was sentenced to 20 years. But the
Maryland Court of Appeals ordered a retrial in December, on the grounds that
the trial court improperly compelled testimony by Stephen Friedman, who at
one point served as Newman's divorce attorney.

In the retrial, Newman's attorneys argued that Landry had acted on her own
and had not intended to kill Slobodow but had entered the house to find
evidence that Slobodow was abusing his children.

"For the second time, I am bitterly disappointed," said Barry H. Helfand,
one of Newman's attorneys, promising an appeal.

Another of Newman's attorneys, Paul V. Jorgensen, said the appeal would be
argued on the grounds that the court had allowed a witness who should have
been protected by attorney-client privilege and that the defense had been
prohibited from introducing evidence that Slobodow had abused his children.

The jury of seven women and five men deliberated for an hour and a half
Thursday and resumed yesterday at 8:30 a.m. At 4:30 p.m., Montgomery County
Circuit Court Judge D. Warren Donahue asked them whether they would like to
resume discussions Tuesday, but two of the jurors said they had other
commitments that would make it difficult for them to attend. So they
reentered the jury room, emerging drained at 7:30 p.m.

"It was just a struggle," said juror Tom Trotter, a Frederick electrician.
"The majority of us thought that she was guilty from what the state
presented," but two on the jury disagreed. "We all struggled with it because
it's a tragedy," he said.

Katherine Winfree, a Montgomery deputy state's attorney, made a point of
shaking the jurors' hands as they left the courtroom. "We are tremendously
grateful and relieved that Arlen Slobodow and his children's nightmare is,
at long last, at an end," she told reporters.

Newman remained expressionless as the jury foreman read the verdict,
lowering her eyes briefly. Helfand stared at his table with his head in one
hand while an assistant for the defense team cried quietly. Jorgensen put
his arm around Newman and whispered something to her as the bailiff came up
to take her to jail.

[end of Washington Post story]

This story is only about the most recent developments in this case,
which dates back three years. Several important elements are not mentioned
in this story. One is that Margery Lemb Landry, the woman who broke into
the father's home, was found to have been carrying some pornographic
magazines featuring children, with the evident intent of planting them in
the father's home to establish the truth of the claim that he was a child
molester. Also unmentioned is the fact that Landry worked in the section of
the State Department that deals with international child custody disputes.
A third element is that the mother was being advised by Dr. Elizabeth
Morgan, a plastic surgeon in the Washington, D.C., area. Dr. Morgan has her
own history. She made unfounded allegations of child abuse against her
estranged husband, Dr. Eric Foretich, and TWICE had a special act of
Congress enacted to (1) release her from jail for violating a court order
telling her that she must disclose where the couple's daughter was being
hidden, and (2) enable her to return from New Zealand, where she had taken
the daughter, so as to remove her from Dr. Foretich, her father.

In my view, it is well beyond time that the media gave some publicity to
the grossly unbalanced situation in the custody area. You are perfectly
correct to say that most fathers do not even seek custody. That is because
they have a very realistic awareness of the extent to which the odds are
stacked against them. If there were a more balanced approach to custody --
if, for example, there were an Equal Custody Opportunity Commission
comparable to the EEOC in the employment area, to even up the odds on
custody -- the whole family breakdown situation in the U.S. would be
entirely different. For one thing, there is every reason to hope that there
would be far fewer divorces if fathers had a 50/50 chance of getting
custody.

It is absurd to suggest that allegations of parental alienation syndrome
"trigger instant death for mothers." On the contrary, the custody
statistics indicate how far the odds are stacked against fathers. A further
example of this bias is the way in which huge amounts of taxpayer money are
devoted to making sure that fathers pay the "child support" that has been
imposed upon them, while next to nothing is spent on enforcing fathers'
visitation times with their children.

I have no doubt that, sadly, there are cases where fathers are child
molesters. No doubt there also are cases where unfounded allegations are
made against mothers. The way to deal with these situations is to have
careful investigation by unbiased parties. But to suggest that the scales
in family courts be even more tilted against fathers than they are already
is just ludicrous.

"Dusty" wrote in message
...
This guy's an "investigative reporter"??? This "story" is so blatantly
anti-father, this guy should be shot. I'm sure the script that PBS
followed
was written by a feminazi.. The "reporter" certainly is.

Fortunatly, this "senior editor" left his contact info at the bottom of
the
article... Give'em an ear full - of TRUTH.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

http://timesunion.com/AspStories/sto...gory=OPINION&B
CCode=HOME&newsdate=10/16/2005

Custody fight

Documentary sheds light on system that lets children suffer at the hands
of
abusive fathers

By BOB PORT
First published: Sunday, October 16, 2005

This week, every judge, lawyer, psychiatrist, psychol social worker with
any
connection to family law in New York ought to be taken into custody,
escorted to their local courthouse and forced to watch "Breaking the
Silence: Children's Stories," a PBS documentary set to air in the Capital
Region at 10 p.m. Thursday on WMHT Ch. 17.
Before coming to Albany, I worked for years at the New York Daily News. I
had occasion to cover stories from Family Court and custody battles,
largely
in New York City. I've heard the tales of more than a hundred people in
recent years caught up in the "Twilight Zone" of a custody dispute, as
many
of them identically refer to the legal system.

This exquisite documentary, "Children's Stories," like no other production
I
have seen, makes comprehensible the subtlety of a scandal that recurs in
custody proceedings in New York and other states. It is an almost
impossible
story to tell, one from which journalists flee, and it boils down to this:
A
judge, often misled by self-interested lawyers and court-appointed
professionals, ignores a protective mother, ignores the wishes of children
and awards custody to a man who is an abuser, emotionally or physically,
of
his wife or their children.

In a bitter irony, the judge orders this injustice wrapped in the banner
that is New York's legal standard for deciding custody: "best interests of
the child."

What our legal system has failed to grasp is that lust for vengeance
drives
the worst of fathers to use litigation itself as a way to abuse ex-wives.
Their economic incentive has also grown. Winning custody can be cheaper
than
child support.

"Children's Stories," filmed partly in Loudonville, will not try your
patience with he-said, she-said debate between couples or among experts.
Save that for later. Instead, the filmmakers select wise experts to
explain
and ask that you do two things our courts easily fail to do: Trust mothers
to behave like mothers and listen to what children say.

There is little Sarah, ordered to live with a father she feared. "You feel
like," she says, biting her lip, "you want to die."

There is the terror-stricken voice of Manya recorded on the phone,
pleading
with her mother to rescue her from her father, who molested her for years.
"I don't care if you have to break the law," she sobs, "get me out right
now."

There are the observations of Jeff, who turned 18 and escaped, but who
remains haunted at having lain awake across the hall from his little
sister
as she was raped and sodomized by his dad, who won custody. "It's the most
helpless feeling," Jeff laments.

These are the raw extremes of custody law gone awry. The typical abusive
parent is less severe or far less obvious, and abuse is always difficult
to
discern. Two adult men speak in "Children's Stories" with memories of
their
own abusive fathers to shed light.

One of them, Joe Torre, manager of the New York Yankees, who suffered in
the
care of a violent father, recalls why he never called police. "My father
was
the police," Torre says.

"It is never an event," says the other, Walter Anderson, CEO of Parade
magazine. "It is a pattern of behavior." Abuse, he explains, is "the
systematic diminishment of the child." This common sense can elude family
courts.

Some facts are in order here. We're talking about a big but very narrow
problem. Custody is not disputed in court in the overwhelming majority of
divorces as many as nine in 10 cases settle amicably, according to
studies.
In uncontested custody, mothers win out over fathers, taking custody about
2-1, although this is partly because some fathers see trying to win
custody
as futile.

Contested custody, about 10 percent of break-ups, clogs courts. In these
disputes, some studies show, a mildly abusive, or brutally battering or
seriously molesting parent lurks in three fourths of cases. It can be a
mother, but mostly it tends to be a father, and recent studies show
fathers
winning these battles 2-1.
Do the math. It's a problem.

Custody case law in New York, as in many states, enshrines one of the most
ridiculous legal principles ever to evolve, called "parental alienation."

Conceived by the late Columbia University psychiatrist Richard Gardner,
"parental alienation syndrome" was a proposed name for a mental illness in
which a mother, to punish her ex-mate, alienates kids against dad by
coaching them to allege abuse.

The antidote for this alleged insanity, Gardner theorized, is to give the
kids to dad, thereby counteracting mom's alienation by removing the kids
from her control. It's the ultimate mind game in custody battles. We can
almost never prove what's really true in an abuse allegation, and a bald
abuse allegation, even if false or exaggerated itself, can be symptomatic
of
a deeper, less severe pattern that is true. The victim of abuse thus
becomes
the perpetrator and a villain can win. Gardner's ideas became a playbook
for
fathers using litigation to punish ex-lovers.

Gardner's colleagues rejected the addition of his theory to the Diagnostic
and Statistical Manual, the peer-reviewed handbook of mental illnesses.
His
work has been debunked by the American Psychological Association and
others.
Parental alienation syndrome is junk science.

Yet in a monument to ignorance, New York courts continue to recognize
"parental alienation" as if it were some psycho-law of medicine and
continue
to give kids to oppressive, if not abusive fathers simply when mothers
make
accusations. It's as if judges are years behind in reading social science
literature.

Father's rights groups have legitimate concerns about false abuse
allegations, but given the nature of contested custody, these utterances
should not trigger instant death for mothers. Yet, Gardner's remedy for
alienation is etched in precedent in our state appellate law books. Judges
continue to fall for it as medical dogma when it comes from
court-appointed
forensic psychiatrists. These experts, unregulated in the court system,
are
often ordered by a judge to evaluate parents, but they answer to no one.
They must be right, judges are pressed to believe. After all, judges
appointed them.

In "Children's Stories," a judge, who happens to be a social worker, as
perhaps we should require of all our Family Court judges, tries to set the
record straight. Maybe our Court of Appeals will get the message.

Also aired in this documentary are the problems with some law guardians,
lawyers appointed for children. The documentary shows us how they can do
more harm than good. They can be patronage-seeking pals of judges who
authorize legal fees billed to parents for whatever the market will bear.

Law guardians may not listen to their clients, the children, and they
inevitably end up taking sides, then avoid communication with the losing
side. They can freely engage in what lawyers call ex-parte communication
they talk to one side without the other present. Judges do it, too. It's
unethical and it deprives one party of a fair hearing. Yet, in our family
courts, ex-parte exchanges, even hearings, can be standard operating
procedure.

Dominique Lasseur, the producer of "Children's Stories," told me he
expects
to be sued, but I say he deserves a Nobel Prize for honesty for his work
here. The Mary Kay Ash Charitable Foundation, which financed this effort,
deserves our gratitude. And this documentary should prove again the
incalculable value of public broadcasting.

An annual event at Siena College became the setting for some of
"Children's
Stories." Mo Therese Hannah, a psychology professor at Siena, is already
organizing the third Battered Mothers' Custody Conference there, set for
next January.

The judiciary in New York is aware of the problems you'll see on TV. A
32-member Matrimonial Commission, appointed by our chief judge, has heard
from hundreds of citizens. Appellate Judge Sondra Miller of Westchester
County, chairwoman, says her commission is preparing its report for
release
in December and it will recommend major changes.

"We hope that we can change the tenor of these proceedings," Miller said.
She intimated her commission is considering some new court model for
resolving custody, one based on principles of mediation and arbitration
more
than advocacy.

We'll all be watching.

Bob Port is senior editor/investigations at the Times Union. He can be
reached at 454-5064 or by e-mail at



--------------------------------------------------------------------
Liberalism: that haunting fear that someone,
somewhere, can help themselves without
Government intervention.

Here is the e-mail I have sent in response to this story:

Dear Mr. Port:

Your story about the PBS documentary "Breaking the Silence: Children's
Stories" was put up on an Internet news group that I follow. I am disturbed
by the whole flavor of the story.

It appears from this story that you have been seriously misled. You
should look at the big picture. The overall truth of the situation is that
the judicial system in the U.S. is grotesquely biased against fathers. I
have been following these issues for nearly 20 years. The fact of the
matter is that, while the statistics vary from one jurisdiction to another,
the highest percentage I have ever seen for paternal custody is 15. In
short, the glass ceiling on paternal custody remains firmly in place. The
realistic approach for most fathers facing divorce is to assume that custody
will be decided, not by the courts or any other third party, but by the
mother. If she wants custody she will get it, regardless of what the father
wants.

So the idea that that there is any significant tendency to award custody
to abusive fathers, or ANY fathers, is just nonsense. It is far more true
to say that allegations of abuse directed at the father have become almost a
routine weapon in custody disputes where the mother feels there is any
danger that she will not gain custody.

There are, of course, well-known dangers in generalizing from the
particular. However, from your article, it seems that you find anecdotal
evidence to be very compelling. So perhaps you will find the story of what
happened in a Maryland suburb of Washington, D.C., to be an illustration of
the other side of this issue. Here is the latest round of court action in
this case:

Md. Lawyer Convicted in Plot to Kill Husband

By Nelson Hernandez
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 8, 2005; Page B04

A Bethesda lawyer accused of conspiring with her best friend to kill her
estranged husband as a way of resolving a bitter child-custody battle was
convicted on all counts yesterday by a Frederick County jury.

The verdict came after a two-week court battle culminating in a heated
11-hour session in the jury room.

The guilty decision against Elsa D. Newman -- on charges of conspiracy to
commit first-degree murder and attempted first-degree murder, as well as
three lesser charges -- came 10 months after Maryland's highest court threw
out her conviction in Montgomery County, prompting a retrial and the
movement of the case to Frederick County Circuit Court.

Prosecutors claimed that Newman, 52, became so desperate after losing
custody of her two sons that she plotted with a close friend, former State
Department employee Margery Lemb Landry, to kill her husband, Arlen J.
Slobodow. Landry broke into Slobodow's home in Bethesda early Jan. 7, 2002,
while Slobodow was sleeping in a bed with his 5-year-old son, and shot
Slobodow in the leg.

Landry escaped after a struggle, but Slobodow was able to tear off the ski
mask covering her face and called police. He survived the attack.

After pleading guilty in September 2002, Landry was sentenced to 20 years in
prison. In the first trial, Newman also was sentenced to 20 years. But the
Maryland Court of Appeals ordered a retrial in December, on the grounds that
the trial court improperly compelled testimony by Stephen Friedman, who at
one point served as Newman's divorce attorney.

In the retrial, Newman's attorneys argued that Landry had acted on her own
and had not intended to kill Slobodow but had entered the house to find
evidence that Slobodow was abusing his children.

"For the second time, I am bitterly disappointed," said Barry H. Helfand,
one of Newman's attorneys, promising an appeal.

Another of Newman's attorneys, Paul V. Jorgensen, said the appeal would be
argued on the grounds that the court had allowed a witness who should have
been protected by attorney-client privilege and that the defense had been
prohibited from introducing evidence that Slobodow had abused his children.

The jury of seven women and five men deliberated for an hour and a half
Thursday and resumed yesterday at 8:30 a.m. At 4:30 p.m., Montgomery County
Circuit Court Judge D. Warren Donahue asked them whether they would like to
resume discussions Tuesday, but two of the jurors said they had other
commitments that would make it difficult for them to attend. So they
reentered the jury room, emerging drained at 7:30 p.m.

"It was just a struggle," said juror Tom Trotter, a Frederick electrician.
"The majority of us thought that she was guilty from what the state
presented," but two on the jury disagreed. "We all struggled with it because
it's a tragedy," he said.

Katherine Winfree, a Montgomery deputy state's attorney, made a point of
shaking the jurors' hands as they left the courtroom. "We are tremendously
grateful and relieved that Arlen Slobodow and his children's nightmare is,
at long last, at an end," she told reporters.

Newman remained expressionless as the jury foreman read the verdict,
lowering her eyes briefly. Helfand stared at his table with his head in one
hand while an assistant for the defense team cried quietly. Jorgensen put
his arm around Newman and whispered something to her as the bailiff came up
to take her to jail.

[end of Washington Post story]

This story is only about the most recent developments in this case,
which dates back three years. Several important elements are not mentioned
in this story. One is that Margery Lemb Landry, the woman who broke into
the father's home, was found to have been carrying some pornographic
magazines featuring children, with the evident intent of planting them in
the father's home to establish the truth of the claim that he was a child
molester. Also unmentioned is the fact that Landry worked in the section of
the State Department that deals with international child custody disputes.
A third element is that the mother was being advised by Dr. Elizabeth
Morgan, a plastic surgeon in the Washington, D.C., area. Dr. Morgan has her
own history. She made unfounded allegations of child abuse against her
estranged husband, Dr. Eric Foretich, and TWICE had a special act of
Congress enacted to (1) release her from jail for violating a court order
telling her that she must disclose where the couple's daughter was being
hidden, and (2) enable her to return from New Zealand, where she had taken
the daughter, so as to remove her from Dr. Foretich, her father.

In my view, it is well beyond time that the media gave some publicity to
the grossly unbalanced situation in the custody area. You are perfectly
correct to say that most fathers do not even seek custody. That is because
they have a very realistic awareness of the extent to which the odds are
stacked against them. If there were a more balanced approach to custody --
if, for example, there were an Equal Custody Opportunity Commission
comparable to the EEOC in the employment area, to even up the odds on
custody -- the whole family breakdown situation in the U.S. would be
entirely different. For one thing, there is every reason to hope that there
would be far fewer divorces if fathers had a 50/50 chance of getting
custody.

It is absurd to suggest that allegations of parental alienation syndrome
"trigger instant death for mothers." On the contrary, the custody
statistics indicate how far the odds are stacked against fathers. A further
example of this bias is the way in which huge amounts of taxpayer money are
devoted to making sure that fathers pay the "child support" that has been
imposed upon them, while next to nothing is spent on enforcing fathers'
visitation times with their children.

I have no doubt that, sadly, there are cases where fathers are child
molesters. No doubt there also are cases where unfounded allegations are
made against mothers. The way to deal with these situations is to have
careful investigation by unbiased parties. But to suggest that the scales
in family courts be even more tilted against fathers than they are already
is just ludicrous.